Uefa's hopes of introducing a ban on the international transfer of players under the age of 18 could be passed along the same legal lines as the homegrown‑players rule it has successfully introduced.

Michel Platini, the Uefa president, reiterated his intention to introduce new regulations across European football after Chelsea's illegal signing of Lens's Gaël Kakuta led to the club being banned from signing all new players until May 2011.

Although such restrictions on the free movement of footballers would seem to be a prima facie restraint of trade under European employment law, the European Commission interprets them only as "indirect discrimination".

This means the door is ajar for Platini's radical plan, since Uefa successfully persuaded the European authorities to agree to the rule that insists on a quota of home-grown players. A spokesperson for the employment commissioner, Vladimir Spidla, said: "A proposal banning transfers of under-18-year-old players might constitute indirect discrimination in the field of free movement of workers.

"There is well-established case law that provides that indirect discriminations in the field of free movement of workers can be justified. But only if general interest objectives are being pursued and that the differential action is legitimate, proportionate and necessary to reach the objectives pursued."

An alternative route would be for all national governments to bring in to line their employment law with that in England and Germany, where footballers may sign full professional contracts aged 16. But if Platini can persuade the Commission that his objectives are for football's social and educational benefit rather than being a means of straitjacketing English clubs, the ban will be approved.

Over the Hill

Jonathan Hill, the Football Association's respected commercial director, will leave the organisation in three months. Although the news comes within days of E.ON's announcement that it will not renew its sponsorship of the FA Cup, the two events are not believed to be linked.

Hill can be considered the highest-profile casualty of the FA's unpopular relocation to Wembley. Although Hill currently has no role to move to and will be placed on three months' gardening leave, he will seek a position at a club or a sports governing body. After building up a wealth of contacts in the game and the commercial sector during seven years at the FA, Hill is well placed to find a new post.

Held to account

West Ham United formally submitted their accounts to Companies House over the weekend, more than 15 months after the appointed date, but while it was the worst case, they are by no means isolated. Industry best practice dictates that company accounts should be filed one financial quarter after their accounting year end – if firms with £1bn market capitalisations can manage it, what takes so long for football clubs with sub-£100m turnovers? For seven Premier League clubs year end falls on 31 May, suggesting that we might have expected a flurry of books to be registered with Companies House. Yet not one did so within the three-month notional deadline of 31 August. Perhaps they did not wish to have the clubs they were negotiating with about transfers poring over their numbers. But at a time when banks are drawing in their lending to heavily indebted football clubs, a best-practice approach to corporate governance would seem well advised.

Hampshire uncertain

When Hampshire hosts Andrew Strauss and England for the third one-day international tomorrow it will try to give a flavour of the fare on offer to those who invest up to £6,000 each in a bond scheme launched yesterday. But the timing is unfortunate; having declined to bid for the Ashes Test in 2013 that went to Durham, Hampshire will not know for at least 18 months if any five-day matches against Australia will come to the Rose Bowl. Were Hampshire guaranteed Ashes play, oversubscription would have been certain.